get a div value from jquery

Question

In the following div how can i get the value=12 value when the div is clicked

<div value='12' id='div1'>some content</div>

$('#div1').live("click", function(a) {
alert(this.value);
    alert($('#div1').val());  //doesnt work


});

Answer 1

use jquery attr()

Get the value of an attribute for the first element in the set of matched elements or set one or more attributes for every matched element.

try this

 alert($('#div1').attr('value')); 

OR

$('#div1').on("click", function(a) {

   alert($(this).attr('value'));  //doesnt work
});

Answer 2

If you can keep away from using your own HTML attributes you'll run into validation issues, a better choice would html5's data attributes. This allows you to create your own attributes good for holding this type of data. For instance:

<div data-num="12" id="div1">some content</div>

    $('#div1').on('click', function(){
       alert($(this).data('num'));
    });

http://api.jquery.com/jQuery.data/